Shedding Dead Weight
by Chloe Veverka
Summary: So where are we now, Jet? What reasons are there for our existences? Who’s to say we won’t just fade away?" Faye struggles to carry the weight of her feelings for Spike and wonders what her purpose is without the cowboy. Faye's POV. Major spoilers.


A/N: I was digging around my family's old computer and rediscovered this story I'd written back in 2003 (I was just graduating high school, yikes!). It was inspired by a random dream I had from Faye's perspective concerning uber major spoilers on the series' final episodes. My dream was vivid enough (and pops up later in the story) that I wrote it down and expanded from it. Also, I really loved the emotional confusion in Tom Stoppard's "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead"; how the purpose of minor-major characters is heavily influenced by major characters. So here's the result, one of those "post episode 26 major angsty Faye" stories. It's been done by lots of people already, but I wanted to give my 18-year-old self some credit back when I was too shy to share my writing with others. Hence I'm only making minor grammatical changes as I retype this; no rewriting, which might turn out to be a bad thing, haha.

Disclaimer: I don't own _Cowboy Bebop_.

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Shedding Dead Weight

I Don't Want to Wake Up

…He was gone…

Heels clicking consistently away, never pausing, never hesitating. …Away into the darkness. Or away into the light—his light—his awakening into the real world. Like waking up from a long, deep slumber as the sunlight peaks through your eyelids and forces you into its submission, seeing reds and oranges until all fades away in a bright, white light of reality.

…I wanted him to hesitate. I wanted him to pause, to turn around, to say my name, to say anything. Look at me, frown at me, scowl, curse, just…not walk away…walk away into a darkness I couldn't see through. He had to see it through to the end. I could have gone anyways, been the shrew woman that I've been but…I couldn't see. I didn't want to see. I wanted him to call me, say he needed me, wanted me there with him. I didn't want him to die alone. I knew he was going to die. I knew that I would never see him again. I had seen it in his eyes, heard it in his voice. He knew, too. I didn't want him to feel alone in that moment. But…I knew that he didn't need me. This was something only he could do, that only he intended. But…

I never thought it would hurt like this. Looking into his eyes, I never thought I could experience that kind of pain. Worse than not knowing your past, not giving a damn about your future, only concerned with the present. A present focused on a future of death. He never turned around. Never flinched at my vapid firing. He was gone, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.

The gun fell from my hand like a brick. I lost it—my resilience, my iron mask, my hope. It all fell away as I felt my body shake in shock. I would never see him again. I would never see his unruly green puff of hair, smell his band of cigarettes burning in the den, watch his limber movements, hear his detached laughter. If all I had to go on were _memories_, then I was in deep shit. He was gone, the only future left for my heart to cling onto. Yet, he never was my future. He was never mine to begin with. What reason did he have in my life—to break my heart and spirit a thousand times over with that one deep look into my eye?

Within the confounds of the hallway, the silence crept in as I sobbed in anger at my own vulnerability. I should be crying…I shouldn't be fucking crying over that bastard. He never cared. He never showed anything except sarcasm and contempt at me. He never gave me a break. I did nothing right in his eyes. And here I am, mourning, when who's to say he's even dead? Why am I sobbing? Why do I care so much? Why do I love him?

…Stop.

…Stop it.

…Stop crying, Faye.

You can't…I can't…He never loved you. You're alive. You've always been alive. You're fucking alive, breathing, sniffling, crying…You're not dead!

Then I felt it. The hairs stood on end as I suddenly stopped crying. In the dead of the hallway, I felt it. And softly, looming, I heard his voice… "_Bang…_" And then nothing.

*

I don't know when I woke up. I don't remember. I had slid to the ground, a stabbing pain coursing through my body, and then, I felt nothing. I had died. He had killed me. Reality had killed me. I had nowhere to go, no one to go to. What was my purpose in life? I wondered these thoughts aimlessly as tears cascaded down my cheeks, pooling onto the cold metal below. I curled tighter into a ball, my ear chilling to the lack of mechanic functions of the ship. The ship was down. Bebop was dying. I was dying. And I didn't care. I could be just like him. I could be swallowed up in a past I could move on from…except…even that was lost to me.

I clenched my eyes shut. I didn't want to open them anymore. I didn't want to see. There was nothing to see. Everything was different now. No one was left. They were dead. Everything was gone. Nothing left…except Jet.

I felt something just then. A soft prick where my heart should have been. Unwillingly, I peeled open my eyes, staring at the floor in front of me, seeing phantom feet walk by. This must be what Ein saw everyday. Hearing footsteps, heels clicking away into darkness. Seeing a mess of red hair tumble around, singing strange blabberings. Another heart prick. Tired elbows steadied the dead weight on my shoulders as I pulled myself onto my knees. You have to carry that weight. I couldn't look over my shoulder, couldn't look into the darkness. I stood up, knees shaking, and walked toward the cockpit, leaving the gun behind.

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Feel free to review if you'd like, the next (much longer) part coming up soon


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